It’s Summer Blockbuster season, a time when it’s easy (and perfectly understandable) to get completely mesmerized and distracted by the over-VFX‘d, over-hyped, and over-budgeted tentpole franchise films.

Don’t get me wrong, I lie awake at night in anticipation of The Dark Night Rises, Amazing Spider-Man, and Skyfall (not out until November), but there are a few other flicks flying under the radar amid the ridiculousness of the 3D trailers in theatres now that I’m loosing just as much (if not more) sleep waiting for.

So in case you get all your movie salivation from Tribute Magazine or the $6 tie-in Coca-Cola cup at your neighbourhood Googleplex, here are a few lesser-hyped flicks that you should get pumped about, even if they’re not based on a comic book franchise.

John Huston’s adaptation of Dashiell Hammett’s novel The Maltese Falcon is one of those Hollywood warhorses about which it is just about impossible to say anything original. So I’ll start with something someone else has said about it which is still of interest. In a retrospective look at the film in 1960, Dwight Macdonald wrote “I think John Huston’s The Maltese Falcon is the best crime picture ever made in Hollywood…because [it] shows movie types behaving realistically instead of in the usual terms of romantic cliché.” [1]

Realism is probably not the first word that comes to mind today when people think about Falcon. Quite the opposite, people are likely to think of the stylized characters, the obviously contrived and synthetic story, the “hard boiled” dialog and of course, the panoply of fedoras, shoulder-pads, shiny over-sized cars and non-stop smoking that seems (rightly or wrongly) “so ’40s.” There is…

This is, of course, putting aside the question of whether the world even needs one sequel (let alone three) to the absolutely dreadful and inexplicably popular sci-fi blockbuster that was little more than “Dances with Wolves” in outer space. But it looks like we’re getting sequels whether we want them or not:

ComingSoon reports:

“Back in May, James Cameron was first quoted as saying that there might be four “Avatar” movies in total. With the first one having earned a record $2.782 billion at theaters worldwide, star Sigourney Weaver is now saying the next three will be filmed at the same time. Here are several quotes from an interview with Showbiz 411:

When “Political Animals” finishes shooting, see if you can follow Weaver’s schedule: she goes right into a new Christopher Durang play for a short run at Lincoln Center. Then she films “Avatar” 2, 3, and 4 with James Cameron. That’s right: they’re making three sequels to the blue 3D phenom all at the same time. Weaver says she has no idea how long it will take, or how it’s going to work. “I just show up,” she said.”

I’m not even going to bother telling you who stars in the movie or who directs it. At this point, if you don’t know, then you are the last person on Earth to be unaffected by the hype-machine for this movie.

British actor Andrew Garfield has said that making the latest Spider-Man movie left him feeling disillusioned. The 28-year-old plays the superhero in the new film The Amazing Spider-Man.

Speaking to the Radio Times he said that during filming he dreamt of returning to “simpler times” of “struggling…auditioning and getting turned down (and) wondering if I’m ever going to get another job”.

He added that the role meant he had “lost a bit of innocence”. He said “To achieve what you set out to achieve and realise it’s not what you want, it’s disappointing” adding “This role had been something I’d always, always wanted to do. Then you realise it’s like any other acting job.

“Some days it’s great, others you feel lost. And I’d always felt that if I got certain roles then I’d be set for life, emotionally, professionally. It would be Utopia. But you never get to…

As is its custom, Brit film mag Empire comes up with yet another list of the greatest somethings-or-other ever. This time, it’s the 50 Greatest Film Comedies. This one was voted by the readers — so you know who to blame if you disagree.

The Zucker Brothers’ 1980 classic “Airplane” takes top honors — and I can’t say I disagree. Coming in at Nos. 2-5 are “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy” (which I’ll dispute mightily); “The Big Lebowski“; “The Life of Brian” and “Monty Python and the Holy Grail.”